This invention relates generally to cigarette cases for holding a quantity of cigarettes and is particularly directed to a cigarette dispenser which provides limited access to cigarettes stored therein for the purpose of reducing a smoker's consumption of cigarettes.
The physical hazards of cigarette smoking are well known and their consumption discouraged by health authorities. The reduction of cigarette smoking is desirable in itself because it is well-known that the damage due to cigarette smoking is cumulative and dose related. In addition to the danger of fire associated with smoking, medical authorities have shown beyond doubt that there is a greater incidence of heart, lung and throat ailments including cancer among smokers than among non-smokers. In addition, non-smokers who are in the vicinity of a cigarette smoker are exposed to the irritation and possible health hazard of the smoke thus produced. Furthermore, smoking can be a costly habit particularly in the case of a heavy smoker. Thus, ever increasing numbers of smokers have undertaken efforts to reduce, if not to completely stop, cigarette consumption.
Attempts at giving up the cigarette smoking habit have ranged from the use of deterrent drugs to professional counseling and even to hypnosis. These various approaches have, in general, all suffered from various shortcomings. Individual professional and group counselling have met with varying degrees of success, although the former is frequently expensive and the latter frequently inconvenient, requiring time consuming travel and attendance at meetings. In addition, mass communications campaigns sponsored by the government and various nonprofit organizations have attempted to bring the dangers of smoking to the attention of the general public with limited success. Finally, hypnosis is relied upon as an anti-smoking aid, however, its nature discourages many smokers from attempting this approach and it has led to somewhat inconclusive long term results. Hypnosis and other treatment programs are episodic and not directly available to the smoker at each moment of decision to light up.
Other anti-smoking efforts have centered not so much on the individual, but rather on a device for discouraging or inhibiting smoking. Such devices frequently include a cigarette container having a time controlled locking mechanism which provides the smoker with access to the cigarettes only at predetermined times. The use of such devices is based upon the theory that the cigarette smoking habit can best be terminated, or at least controlled, by a gradual withdrawal rather than completely stopping all at once. According to this approach, the craving for cigarettes will gradually subside until it is lost completely. This type of device, however, confronts the smoker with a cigarette abstinence situation, at least temporarily, and frequently proves too much, particularly for the high rate smoker who then circumvents the system by acquiring another source of cigarettes. Thus, after an initial period of use, this type of device is typically discarded by the smoker who is unable to accept and deal with the complete denial, albeit temporary in nature, of access to a cigarette.
The present invention is intended to overcome the limitations of the prior art by providing a device which operates directly and repeatedly at each moment of decision to smoke a cigarette by forcing the smoker to reconsider his decision following the initial urge to smoke by temporarily delaying access to each cigarette while providing the smoker with up-to-date information regarding past cigarette consumption. The present invention does not compel the smoker to quit altogether, but rather allows him/her to control the pace of his/her withdrawal according to individual needs and lessens the possibility of complete discouragement and the giving up of the effort to stop smoking. Access to cigarettes is not completely barred as in other smoking inhibiting devices so as to reduce the incentive of the smoker to circumvent the device by buying more cigarettes and thus giving up on trying to kick the habit.